Support Us Miami's independent source of local news and culture. This morning she was sentenced to 65 months behind bars for her role in a real estate fraud scheme. Tondreau was suspended from office this past May by Gov. Rick Scott after she was arrested on multiple conspiracy and fraud charges.
Though the crimes took place before Tondreau entered office, she had at the time already established herself as an activist and community leader. Along with three partners, Tondreau used her notoriety to attract straw buyers. The victims supplied their personal information to be used on home loan applications in exchange for a fee. The victims were then left in financial and credit ruin. Back in December Tondreau was found guilty of all charges. She could have faced up to 30 years in prison but got off with just 65 months.
Oreste, who plead guilty and agreed to testify against Tondreau, had earlier received an eight-year sentence. The two other partners remain fugitives. Tondreau was originally sentenced to nine years, but the judge immediately reduced it to five years and five months.
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You can help by participating in our "I Support" program, allowing us to keep offering readers access to our incisive coverage of local news, food and culture with no paywalls. Kyle Munzenrieder. Oreste and Tondreau, who at the time was a community activist, hosted several radio show programs in the South Florida area in which they advertised the services offered by KMC Mortgage.
Oreste and Tondreau recruited and paid some of the listeners who responded to those advertisements, as well as other individuals, to pose as borrowers to purchase properties identified by Oreste. Oreste, Odunna, and other co-conspirators prepared or caused to be prepared loan applications on behalf of straw borrowers recruited by Oreste and Tondreau. Odunna was an attorney, previously licensed to practice law in the State of Florida, and president of O. Odunna, P.
The loan applications and supporting documents were submitted by the co-conspirators to various mortgage lenders, throughout the United States. Once the loan applications were approved, Tondreau wired funds to O. In some instances Oreste, Odunna and other co-conspirators created and submitted duplicate HUD-Settlement Statement Forms, which grossly inflated the true purchase price of the properties.
The HUD-1 Settlement Statements also falsely represented to the mortgage lenders that the straw borrowers had met their down payment and cash to close obligations, when in truth and fact, the straw borrowers had never made any such payments. At closing, a portion of loan proceeds were disbursed to Oreste through his company, JR Investment and Mortgage Corporation, or other bank accounts he controlled.
In some instances, a portion of the loan proceeds were diverted to accounts controlled by O. Oreste disbursed some of the proceeds that he received to pay recruiters, such as Tondreau and co-conspirator Kelly Augustin, and straw borrowers. Oreste also transferred a substantial portion of the funds to the bank account of LTO Investment Corporation, a company controlled by Tondreau.
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